Recent veterans struggle to find jobs

Mar. 20, 2014
|

People visit booths of prospective employers during the Hiring Our Heroes job fair at the Washington Convention Center on Jan. 10 in Washington, D.C. More than 80 companies participated in the fair, hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for U.S. veterans and military spouses. / Mark Wilson, Getty Images

by Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY

by Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY

Despite downward trends in unemployment across the country, veterans who served during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars still have difficulty finding work, according to government jobs data issued Thursday.

About one in 11 of them - 9% - were jobless in 2013, lower but not statistically different than the 2012 rate for this group, according to the report issued by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Within that generation, veterans who actually deployed to either or both wars had the highest jobless rates of 10% or more, according to a snapshot of unemployment for one month, August, 2013.

Analysts sayfinding work is toughest on those who served on the front lines: infantry.

"Unfortunately, they are the ones doing most of the fighting and they have the highest unemployment rates," said Tim Isacco, chief operating officer for Orion International, a large veteran recruitment firm.

About 2.8 million Americans have served in uniform since 9/11, and an estimated 200,000 are unemployed, according to government numbers.

Government officials were upbeat, however, about the report issued Thursday. Teresa Gerton, deputy assistant secretary for policy for the Department of Labor's Veterans' Employment Training Service, said those former combat troops who served in Iraq and Afghanistan represent a small portion of the overall number of veterans in America, whose jobless rate fell to 6.6% in 2013.

Those ages 18-24 had a jobless rate of 21.4% in 2013 compared with 14.3% for their civilian counterparts. But Gerton said many are likely living off the unemployment benefits they can receive for 26 weeks and are simply taking a break while they transition from war.

"They're using that time, which is rightly theirs, in recovery ... before actually moving through the employment preparation process to find significant and meaningful jobs," Gerton said.

Isacco said many of them begin by seeking work in retail, security, manufacturing, warehousing, and the food and beverage industry.

But manufacturing -a popular target for these veterans - has turned increasingly to more technically skilled applicants. Other fields such as warehousing, and food and beverage distribution are hiring on a less-lucrative contract basis, Isacco said.

"You're seeing more temp jobs that are out there," he said.

Mike Echols, who studies veteran unemployment at Bellevue University in Omaha, Neb., said a key problem for these veterans is resume preparation, and tailoring them to the jobs they are seeking. Large employers often use software to screen the many resumes they receive, and those from veterans can be automatically rejected because they don't contain words that reflect the employment position they're seeking, Echols said.

"If the veteran is not really experienced in their resume writing, it (the software) immediately rejects the application," he said.

Isacco and Echols both said obtaining some kind of vocational training or an associate's degree before launching a job search is a wise move for these young veterans, all of whom are eligible for education benefits through the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

Gerton said the Pentagon, Labor Department and VA are working to help troops leaving the military prepare better resumes. She said a more advanced training program will become available later this year.

"It's not a bad news story. It's a good news story," Gerton said.

She said there's always a gap in unemployment between those who first leave the military and those who have been out for a longer time. But she acknowledged that the tight job market after the 2007-2009 recession continues to be a drag on employment.

In the years leading up to 2008, the jobless rate for post 9/11 veterans was as low as 6% or 7%, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data.